Vineyard Churches

The Association of Vineyard Churches in the USA

The Vineyard Christian Church is a part of the Association of Vineyard Churches: a community of churches. The Vineyard is not a denomination per se, but we do share a common set of values, a statement of faith and a philosophy of ministry.

The Vineyard movement began in 1977 as a single Vineyard Christian Fellowship within the Calvary Chapel denomination. As more Calvary Chapel churches adopted the Vineyard name a new leader emerged among the churches by the name of John Wimber. John was a musician, and a part of the Righteous Brothers before coming to Christ.

His early Christian experience and ministry as a pastor was among the Friends Churches (Quaker). Later he served as part of the faculty of at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, and as the director of the Fuller Church Growth Institute.

That loose network developed into an association of over 600 churches in the USA and over 2,000 Vineyard Churches world wide. The association has continued to maintain its loose affiliation of autonomous churches linked by a shared statement of faith, philosophy of ministry, values, and through cooperation, rather than a system of trans-local government and over-sight.